quarta-feira, 30 de janeiro de 2019

ELECTRIC BLUES - Still, Going Strong ! (1979)

ELECTRIC BLUESThe Noordwijk band Electric Blues was founded by Henk Vegt, Bert Bulk and Wendel Hillebrands. The first years (1967-1968) "when the boys only counted 15 years" under the name "Relax" but in 1969 the name was renamed Electric Blues, a name that better covered the load because the repertoire consisted exclusively of Blues songs of John Mayall-Cuby-Savoy Brown-Ten Years After Livin'Blues etc. In 1969 drummer Dick van Oosten joined the band. Soon the band was asked for performances, first in the Bulb Region and later on far beyond in Germany. In Noordwijk and the surrounding area the band had many loyal fans who traveled with all performances. The band already had a unique Bandbus for that time, on which ELECTRIC BLUES was chalked in large letters. The guitarist Wendel Hillebrands was for that time a real attraction, he saw n.l. chance to conjure up the difficult and especially fast blues riffs from his Les Paul guitar, something that back then (1970 and over from GB) could hardly be seen on the Dutch stages. Wendel was in a wheelchair because he had been paralyzed in childhood. But .... he was dragged everywhere by the band members and was a full-fledged band member. Unfortunately, in 1989, Wendel died at the age of 41.In the seventies the band was also asked for the hugely popular TV program "Voor de fuist weg" by Willem Duys. In this program, many bands broke through, so also for Electric Blues an excellent opportunity, but Wendel refused to offer him mooting reasons, Too bad .... other ??In 1974 mouth harmonica virtuoso Pietro Smeding (Red Pietro) was brought to the band and not without success, Pietro knows to the present day to play a fantastic piece of blues harp. In 1979 the band released their first LP called "Still going Strong" , composed solely of this work, mostly composed of texts by Henk Vegt. Henk has always been the driving force behind the band, once started as a singer / guitarist and from 1974 as a singer / drummer. The entire management and PR activities were and continue to be provided by Henk Vegt.In the early years the band rehearsed in Sassenheim in the bulb shed of Warnaar on the Hoofdstraat, but soon the band moved to the familiar Noordwijk to the bulb shed of the Fam.Duindam on the Schiestraat.De last 5 years of the existence of the band found rehearsals take place in the bulb shed of Piet Warmerdam in Noordwijkerhout.Henk Vegt and Bert Bulk have always been members of the band after a short break. Together they have loved and suffered from birth in the Schoolstraat (Henk 4-2-1952) and the Julianastraat (Bert 1-3-1952). each other shared both at school and daily with the band.Since November 2011 the band rehearses weekly and with great enthusiasm in the farm of Henk Vegt. The place of Wendel has been taken over by the well-known guitarist Aadje Kreeft who in the seventies has seen all Dutch and many foreign pop venues with the bands Blue Planet-The Incrowd-Think Tank and George Cash. Aad released several LPs and singles of which the famous: I'm going man I'm going from Blue Planet and Nightingale from George Cash.To give the band a bit more body, Edwin van Schijndel has joined (ex-In Crowd)